The metal-insulator crossover of the in-plane resistivity upon temperature decrease, recently observed in several classes of cuprate supercoductors, when a strong magnetic field suppresses the superconductivity, is explained using the U(1) X SU(2) Chern-Simons gauge field theory. The origin of this crossover is the same as that for a similar phenomenon observed in heavily underdoped cuprates without magnetic field. It is due to the interplay between the diffusive motion of the charge carriers and the "peculiar" localization effect due to short-range antiferromagnetic order. We also calculate the in-plane transverse magnetoresistance which is in fairly good agreement with available experimental data.